


Porcelain and Steel

by alex_kade



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Q is not a Damsel in Distress, and q being annoyed, but could also be read as just friend fluff, if that's what you prefer, it's right on the edge of being slash, just good old fashioned action, pre-slash?, probably, there's no smut basically, with a good bit of hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:40:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25559701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alex_kade/pseuds/alex_kade
Summary: Q and Bond get into a bit of trouble, but who actually saves who is debatable.
Relationships: James Bond & Q
Comments: 5
Kudos: 32





	Porcelain and Steel

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little bit of ridiculousness. This is what happens when plot bunnies attack your face out of the blue. Something short and quick enough where I don't feel bad about being distracted from my chapter works, but just long enough to be a satisfying read. (I hope so anyway!).

“Bond, I demand you put me down this instant!”

There had rarely been a time in Q’s life when he had ever felt so mortifyingly humiliated! There he was, the grande Quartermaster of MI6, slung over his agent’s back as if he were nothing but a useless sack of potatoes! He may have been a little banged up but he was more than capable of running on his own two legs, dammit!

“007, if you’re not going to put me down, at least give me a weapon so I can cover your bloody behind since you insist on making me look at it!”

One of James’s guns was roughly shoved into Q’s hand, improving his situation somewhat and his mood when he actually got a chance to use it. Untrained in the field as he may have been, people often forgot that as the person who invented most every weapon being used in the double-o program, Q was often the very person who spent late nights testing them out. Shooting a gun came just as easily to him as any of his agents, and in a situation like this one where it was life or death for everyone involved, he wasn’t going to be any more hesitant on shooting a living target than he was the paper ones set up in his quiet basement.

He missed MI6’s basement now. ‘ _Don’t worry, Q, you’ll be perfectly safe at the embassy_ ,’ they had said. In a country that was already on the verge of war. Yes, that was a bloody brilliant idea, sending valuable Quartermasters into an area where fighting could break out at the drop of a pin. It didn’t matter a lick to him that he’d been personally requested to aid with some new intelligence software that would hopefully lead to an end to the fighting; he knew the technology was only going to be the beginning of ceasing what was still going to be a long, drawn out feud between differing peoples. It didn’t matter to him what made MI6 look professional and kept their ties intact with potential future assets. What mattered was that he had adamantly argued against being sent here and they had forced him to go anyway with nothing but a one 007 to protect him.

Furious, he took out his anger and his _I told you so’s_ on enemy invaders who were keen on taking him and his agent out. Bond cleared the front, Q cleared the back, and anyone attacking from the sides got wiped out by whoever happened to spot them first, all the while with him still dangling uncomfortably across 007’s shoulder. He decided then and there that as soon as Bond set him down, he was going to stab the man with a pen.

“Extraction point?” 007 huffed out as he barrelled his way out the door and into the fighting happening all around them in the streets. At least out there, there were more people engaging with each other so odds were better that no one would be gunning specifically for them. 

Q took a moment to tap a few things out on the screen of his smartwatch while still making sure to keep an eye out for potential threats. “Head north-northwest, roughly eight kilometers outside of city limits. You _will_ put me down once we clear the perimeter, that is not a request.”

“We’ll see,” Bond bit out very seriously. Q thought momentarily about shooting him in the bloody arse, but then _he_ would be the one who’d have to carry a bleeding agent through the battlezone, and unfortunately he lacked both the muscle and basic body mass to pull off such a Herculean feat.

It was when they had gotten within mere meters of escape when Q would have a chance to test that theory. Bond had woven them through the city streets quite expertly, managing to avoid the worst of the ongoing invasion, but just as they were nearing the city limit an explosion went off in a building just ahead of them. Debris flew out into the street in a cloud of destruction, the force of which sent both men flying through the air to land in a heap on the road.

Q sat up swaying, coughing on dust and wincing against the ringing in his ears. He hadn’t felt like he'd been knocked unconscious, but given the new feel of warm liquid running down his face to join what had already been there on the other side, he wouldn’t be surprised if he’d been out for at least a few minutes. He could feel new hurts through the adrenaline coursing through his veins, but more importantly what he didn’t feel were rough hands scooping him up off the ground.

“Bond?” he coughed out, trying to blink through the haze of floating debris. “007, report.” Cursing under his breath, he began to crawl around the street, feeling around him with the hopes of running into his agent nearby. They’d been quite attached only moments before, they couldn’t have been blown too far apart. “James Bond, where the bloody hell are you?”

There was still no answer which alarmed Q more than he would openly admit, but his hands did bump up against a leg. He blinked the tears out of his irritated eyes, trying his best to clear them of the stinging particles biting into him like being stuck out in a sand storm, and leaned over the body as he worked his hands up it. “Bond, you’d better not be dead,” he murmured, relieved to find a pulse and the subtle movement of a chest rising and falling.

Shouts were heard in the distance, and after a moment to gain his bearings as some of the debris finally cleared, Q sucked in a breath and worked at getting 007 onto _his_ shoulders now in a fireman's carry. It was awkward, and he stumbled horribly in the act of gaining his feet, but between adrenaline, fear, and pure stubbornness, he somehow managed to pull it off. He just hoped it would last long enough to get them to their extraction point.

~~~~~~~

“Safe. ...Ow. Next time somebody tells me I’m going to be perfectly safe—oh, these _bloody_ rocks!—I’m going to drop them in a pit and leave them there.”

Q staggered and nearly tipped both he and an increasingly heavier 007 sideways into the packed sand, but managed somehow to right himself at the last second. It wouldn’t do to smash either of their heads open even further on one of the many rocks and stones he’d been tripping over for the past two kilometers; he swore the blasted things were rising up out of the ground every few steps on purpose. It was almost enough to make him give up on the spot, but he still had so many more kilometers to go.

At least it didn’t seem like anyone was tailing them. The sounds of fighting had fallen into the distance, though he could still hear the larger explosions that struck the burning city on occasion. He considered putting Bond down so he could rest for a moment and catch his breath, but he was afraid once he did so, he wouldn’t be able to get the larger man back up again. No, he’d just have to keep going until he either made his goal, fell over trying, or 007 decided to wake up and do his own walking.

“You’ve picked the worst time to be lazy, James,” he ground out as he continued placing one foot in front of the other. “Really, for all the bravado you showed carrying your perceived damsel in distress through the city, who didn’t even need it at the time, I’ll point out, you’re certainly proving to be quite useless now.”

It didn’t escape Q’s attention that he was talking to himself really, and it had nothing to do with his head injuries. He didn’t think it did, anyway. It just seemed to help keep him focused, pretending to chastise James like he so often did through the comms back in the true safety of Q Branch. Besides, it was possible something would get through that damned thick skull of Bond’s and stir him back to consciousness. 

“I mean, look at me, Bond. You insisted I was too injured to run over a split eyebrow and a skinned knee—” Alright, admittedly it may have been a little more than that, but still, the initial injuries weren’t anything the Quartermaster couldn’t have dutifully ignored. “—yet here I am now, half bloody blown up, and I’m the one carrying you! I can’t even see out of one eye right now, you know. Do you have any inkling as to how difficult it is to navigate one’s way through a minefield of intelligent, mischievous rocks when blinded in one eye?”

He wasn’t actually blinded in one eye, but the wound on his forehead from the blast had successfully bled into it so heavily that he was forced to keep it shut. If he had been clear-headed enough to think about it more, he would’ve realized it was the lack of depth perception that was making it so difficult to maneuver around the obstacles on the ground, but he was too tired and out of sorts to consider that. His only mission at the moment was to keep moving until they reached their destination.

Another two kilometers later and fate worked against him, sending him on another stumble that did wind up with him and his heavy burden sprawled out on the ground this time. “Drat,” Q cursed as he rolled over onto his back, arms splayed out to the side as he lay blinking up at the sun. Halfway. He’d only managed to get them halfway there before he’d managed to screw it up, but frankly he didn’t have the energy to keep going. He hurt everywhere, he was hot and thirsty, and just the thought of trying to get Bond back up on his shoulders made him groan. It disgusted him. Four kilometers wasn’t even really that far to go, and if he’d been built of the more firm stuff of his 00-agents, he would’ve had no trouble getting there at all. 

Then again, it was one such agent who’d been thoroughly unconscious this entire time while Q was the one doing all the heavy lifting. Perhaps he should be more proud of that fact, but at the moment all he wanted to do was sleep. Maybe a few minutes of rest would do him a bit of good after all, and then he would try again. He just needed to close his eyes for a moment or two.

~~~~~~~

“Wha-?” he gasped out as he woke up somehow in motion. It was very disorienting, falling asleep on solid ground and opening his eyes to the feel of being swaddled in a rocking hammock. 

No, no that wasn’t right. He was cradled in something much sturdier than that, and warmer. _Arms_ , he realized with a start, arms and a warm chest.

“Bond, are you carrying me again?” he sighed, but was too tired and too relieved to have his agent back on his feet to be angry about the fact.

“Try to relax, Quartermaster. We’re almost there.”

Q had no intention of doing anything _but_ relaxing for the time being. He’d done half the work, after all, so it was Bond’s turn now to take up the slack. Plus, as unappealing as the thought was of being carried exactly like that distressed damsel he’d been thinking of earlier, this method was at least more comfortable than being draped over the man’s back. The blood on James’s shirt didn’t even bother him as he pressed his face more into the larger man’s shoulder—it was probably his own blood from the head wound anyway. 

“How long was I out for?” he mumbled, wanting to keep himself awake now that he actually had another voice to answer back his own.

He could feel the motion of James shaking his head. “No idea. How long was _I_ out for?”

Q couldn’t help but chuckle at the question somewhat, the motion making him acutely aware of a sharp pain in his side that he hadn’t noticed before, but he was too exhausted to worry about it now. He was sure there were many more pains his body would be bringing online once they were safely back in MI6’s hands and there was no more adrenaline to keep him blissfully in denial of whatever injuries he’d truly acquired.

“Well the sun is still up, so at least we know we weren’t out for too many hours,” he commented as casually as if he were simply noting the weather. The conversation did prompt him to ask a more serious question however, given how far Q had walked with 007 being quite out of commission. “How are you feeling, James, really?”

Bond let out something of a growl deep in his throat. “Well enough to get you to extraction, and a far sight better than you right now, I would guess. How the bloody hell you got us this far will forever be a mystery to me.”

“I keep telling you people I’m not as weak as I look,” Q frowned. “I may be small and generally built like a twig, but I’m not fragile, you know.” 

“Q.” James looked down at him in sheer exasperation. “You carried me halfway through the desert with a bloody piece of rebar in your flank. You shouldn’t have been able to make it this far on your own, let alone hauling my arse along with you.”

Any argument the Quartermaster had at that point fell right off his lips. “Oh,” was all he could manage to get out. No wonder his side hurt then. Oh well, there was nothing to be done for it now. “Well I couldn’t very well have left you behind, now could I? Knowing how much it peeves me when you lot return without valuable tech, imagine how enraged M would be if I returned without a whole agent? I’d never hear the end of it.”

It was Bond’s turn to chuckle now, the movement of his chest under Q’s head flooding him with a warm feeling. It was possibly delirium. “I think he’d be rather more irate to be short his Quartermaster,” he pointed out. “But thank you. I’ll be sure to return the favor.”

“You already are, James. You already are.”

They fell into a tired, companionable silence as Bond got them the rest of the way to the extraction point, and then it was just a matter of time before they would be picked up and headed home.

~~~~~~~

“If you find them, I want them bloody sedated!” Mallory was almost yelling as he stormed through Medical.

Q smirked as he watched from the safety of one of his cameras in his quiet little corner of the Q Branch basement. Where he belonged. Which was definitely _not_ out in the desert somewhere on a mission destined to fail.

Bond laughed as he lounged back on the couch behind him, still pale and bruised and wrapped in bandages, but looking all the better for it now that he was out of a hospital bed. Q probably looked even worse, he knew, but he was capable of walking which meant he was capable of escaping, especially with a 00-agent assisting him. He didn’t relish the idea of being stuck in Medical anymore than any of the double’o’s did. 

“They’ll find us eventually, you know,” 007 pointed out almost lazily.

“They will, probably rather quickly, they know where I like to hide.” The grin didn’t leave Q’s face though. “But good luck getting through that steel door unless they want to risk damaging us further by blowing it off its hinges.”

Blue eyes flashed at him warmly. “You’re rather impish, aren’t you?”

“No more than you are, 007.”

They shared a fond smile before Q gingerly pushed away from the desk and moved to join James on the couch. It was almost astounding to think how close to death’s door they’d both been really only days before. The bit of rebar that had impaled Q hadn’t been overly long or thick, but he’d had to go through emergency surgery right away to get it removed. Between that and his other wounds, coupled with the strain he’d put on himself, it’d been a miracle he hadn’t bled out and a relief that nothing had gotten infected. He had a concussion of course, but Bond’s had been worse in that regard. The back of his head had been shaved quite thoroughly to now show off the grotesque line of stitches that had been required to fix him up. They’d both taken a lot of smaller shrapnel, Q’s knee was in a brace now, and Bond’s arm was in a sling due to a shoulder injury that had also required surgery to fix. The agent still suffered a ringing in one of his ears that they were told would clear in time, but it clearly bugged him more than he let on based on the way he would occasionally reach up to brush his finger across his earlobe. On the bright side, neither of them had walked away with a bullet in them, which Q considered a win.

“How long do we intend to hole up in here?” Bond asked after a moment of contentedly lounging around.

Q tilted his head in thought for a moment. “We have a bathroom with running water, a mini fridge, a coffee maker, and internet to keep ourselves entertained. I’d say we can stay here for days if necessary.”

James laughed loudly at that, one hand going up to brace his shoulder the only sign that the movement had caused him any discomfort. “You’re going to make Mallory regret picking us up from the desert.”

“No, I’m making him regret sending us into it to begin with. Next time he’ll think twice before claiming a touchy situation safe enough for his Quartermaster.”

“I don’t know, Q. I’d say you handled yourself rather well under the circumstances.” Bond’s smile softened as he looked at him, touched with a new sort of admiration for the smaller man. “He may feel even more inclined to send you out in the field.”

“Thank you, but no.” Q’s mouth turned down into a frown. “Capable as I may be, I much prefer the comforts of MI6. But I do hope you’ll remember this next time you feel the need to see me as something more breakable than I am.”

“Trust me, Quartermaster, I won’t be making that mistake again.”

“Good. Tell your friends.” By that, he meant the other 00’s of course.

“I will.”

“Good.” There was another long, satisfied pause before Q turned his head to Bond again. “So are you in? We make our stand here for however long it takes before Mallory declares us insane enough to send us home instead of forcing us back to Medical?”

Bond’s blue eyes glinted with trouble and a new sense of admiration as he nodded to his Quartermaster. “I can’t imagine anything else I’d rather be doing.”

With his own smug, appreciative grin, Q settled further into the cushions and flipped one of his computer screens to play a movie, more than happy to spend the next few days with his damned arse of a 00-agent. He couldn’t imagine anywhere else he wanted to be, either.

_End_


End file.
